The whole of Bermuda would be a nice neighbourhood in Nigeria, according to Ibukun Awosika, the keynote speaker at the Mary Prince Women’s Entrepreneurial and Leadership Conference.

As the first female chair of First Bank of Nigeria and an advocate for women’s leadership across Africa, Ms Awosika drew a playful contrast between her sprawling home country of 220 million people from over 350 tribes speaking over 500 languages, and Bermuda’s tight-knit island community.

“Our diversity is beautiful … but I envy your unity of purpose and your oneness,” she told the audience at Pier Six yesterday, kicking off the two-day conference.

“What is easier in the neighbourhood — it is easier to fight over cricket. You guys can always resolve that, I’m sure, one way or another. But I treasure who you are. I value it. I learn from it.”

The conference, founded by Dana Selassie, also marked the official launch of Gifted — Girls in Film, Technology, Entertainment and Design — a new charity that aims to guide Bermudian teens towards creative careers. The initiative’s first major project is a youth-directed film about Mary Prince, a Bermudian national hero.

“This transcends a conference,” Dr Selassie said. “We are cultivating a culture of women who lead with authority, who raise children with vision and who claim spaces where we’ve been told we do not belong.”

The launch included a creative masterclass for teen girls, led by Ms Awosika herself. Dr Selassie said she first met Ms Awosika years ago at a UN Women event in Jamaica, when her own future felt uncertain.

“She looked me straight in the eye and said, ‘So what are you going to do now?’” Dr Selassie recalled. That question led her here.

Finally, to the handful of men in the audience, she said: “We have a lot going on in our community right now and again, this isn’t just about the women. It’s the men as well. And I don’t want the men to ever feel that we are being separatists or divisive.”

One of the best ways to reach men and boys is by empowering the women in their lives, she said.

“We are the ones that are going to birth this next generation of sons,“ she said. ”So we don't want to see another mother have to bury her son.“